My favorite was Phil in the beginning with his hands on his hips. He looked like a superhero! 
Okay, so I love Phil. I can’t help it!
The 4-hour penalty was the rule last season, as demonstrated when Haley and whatshisface gave up on the key-lock roadblock. The only difference was that last season, the producers added the 4 hours upon arriving at the pit stop, whereas in this leg the four-hour penalty was imposed immediately.
In this case, I think a 4-hour penalty put every quitting team in danger of losing the race. If Susan and Patrick hadn’t been two hours behind every other team, with the non-blondes even further back since they drove 2.5 hours out of their way, we would have been seeing a footrace to the finish with Ray and Deana or Gretchen and Meredith eliminated.
This leg was the shortest so far-- I think less than 16 hours for Rob and Amber, and less than 13 for most teams – so a 4 hour penalty is considerable.
Except that Ray & Deanna and Gretchen & Meredith’s penalties didn’t start until Susan & Patrick arrived. It took Patrick a significant amount longer than four hours to finish eating. It certainly put them in danger of losing, but Susan & Patrick’s distance behind had nothing to do with it. He still had to eat faster than the penalty, which he didn’t.
But the idea that he should have to eat faster than a penalty seems to me to be poor planning by the producers. Actually the best solution would have been something akin to a x hour penalty plus the amount of time it took the slowest team to complete the task
I don’t disagree, though I think the solution is to not have tasks that are guaranteed to take longer than your penalty. I always hate watching the eating tasks (though I’d rock at them in real life).
I don’t think the producers are too upset at this anyway, as it made for great TV.
Did anyone take note of the fact that Rob and Amber began the episode with a 50 minute head-start over the number 2 team? They also had a 3 hour headstart over the ninth-place finishers. That clearly demonstrates how thoroughly they dominated last week’s race. I personally like the fact they they are treating TAR like the contest that it is, instead of whining about how others aren’t playing fair. It’s a friggin’ race, for crying out loud!
I think if Patrick stopped mugging for the camera and just sat down and ate they probably could have got to the mat no less than an hour after Gretchen and Meredith.
Uchenna and Bianca proved you didn’t have to take six hours to eat the meat.
Patrick’s a whiner and I can’t wait for him to go.
Well, now, that’s the key, isn’t it? I don’t think I’ve seen such a short penalty for skipping a task, so it begs the question: Did the producers set it up because two seasons of Rob on Survivor told the powers that be at CBS that he wouldn’t be able to resist playing the penalty angle? After all, we may think of it as a race, but they they think of it as a TV show that needs good moments.
From the Leaderboard:
Alex/Ross the Intern: Alex, way to suck down that tubesteak…errrr, cow intestine! :D. This team’s beginning to grate, but they played this leg very well.
Uchenna/Joyce: I love Uchenna’s reaction shots. They’re my faves at the moment.
Brian/Greg: OK, hang on a sec while I figure this out… altitude generally makes one lightheaded and unable to concentrate well. Yet this team made their most lucid comments while at the top of the Andes…ergo… they are actually putting forth conscious mental effort to be as doofy as they are the rest of the time. Yeeeeesh!
Ron/Kelly: I’m trying to hold back what need to be said about this guy, and I think I can do it for one more week…
Rob/Amber: He is what he is. I find him no more conniving than Team Guido from Season 1. I’m rooting against him, but I can’t exactly say I hate him. I think we’re all a little over-sensitive to unpleasant behavior from the racers due to the extreme head cases present during the last two seasons. But the brainless comeraderie of the pack this time around shows the consequences of everyone playing nicey-nicey to each other. She on the other hand, reminds me of a particularly difficult co-worker from a couple of jobs back. So I really hope they lose. But it will be interesting to see what happens when real jet lag and fatigue set in. When the hell are they leaving the New World, already?
Ray/Deana Here’s the real dickhead this season. At first I thought he was putting Deana into these early roadblocks so he’d be available for later ones, given the Chip Memorial Roadblock Limit Rule, but looking back, I’m not sure they kept that rule. It’s not mentioned in the glossary on the show’s site, and i don’t recall Phil mentioning it yet… which means Ray’s just a dick.
Meredith/Gretchen: Sure Gretchen, you make it up to Meredith for your logorrhea, but what do WE get as compensation for listening to you yammer on?
Susan/Patrick: Will it be Meredith and Gretchen who get Philiminated next time, or these two? Either way, we all win! Yay!
Debbie/Bianca: If you don’t have a sense of direction, you can’t win TAR. Shame. I’d have to say the top three are going to be Rob/Amber, Uchenna/Joyce, and either the gay couple or the dorkus boys. Everyone else is just hanging around, waiting to get picked off.
It’s the same penalty that Hayden & Aaron incurred last year at the key unlocking Detour.
The rule was mentioned in leg 2. Not that he’s not still a dick.
I would like to say, in Kim’s defense, that she did do one Roadblock (Episode 6 - scarab search). And Christie and Nicole both did one Roadblock each (Episode 4 - caviar eating). But I do like calling it the “Chip Memorial Roadblock Limit Rule,” because Chip was a nice guy and not, you know, ass.
Not that I’m one to stand up for mommy and the boy, but on the “CBS Insider Videos” they explain what really happened.
Mom and boy didn’t want to eat the meat, and they misunderestimated the eating prowess of a woman on a mission. They thought they would try to fool the girls into believing they were eating, when actually they were going to take the four hour penalty. However, when it became apparent that the girls were not going to give up, mom and boy, had to eat meat, post-haste. That’s why it took them so long.
Which just goes to show, even when the rest of these idiots TRY to “pull a Rob”, they can’t play their way out of a paper bag…
But weren’t the girls in question the last team? Why on earth would they quit the Roadblock, when it would have to mean instant elimination, no? If that was their strategy, I would have kept my mouth shut about it, on the idea that it is marginally better to look merely whiny than completely stupid.
Hear! Hear!
Well, I’ve only watched maybe two or three episodes of TAR (ever, from all the seaons), so I’m not familiar with the way the headstarts work. Did it seem odd to anyone else that they staggered everyone’s start times like that (which I think is good, in theory) but they started team Romber off just after midnight, and the parking garage didn’t open until 5am? WTF is the point of basing start times on the rankings in the previous leg, if you then turn around and completely negate the effect of the start? If anything, the later-starting teams had an advantage, because they got another hour or so of sleep.
I realize there’s going to be choke-points in the race (usually waiting for transportation, e.g. plane flights), but I thought it was stupid to put it right at the beginning of the leg. I would have been better to make the staggered start times truly that, and then have a choke-point later on in the leg.
But like I said, I haven’t seen many episodes. I this common?
Yes, it’s common. And often frustrating. But in defense of the show’s producers, they can’t predict what time the racers will finish the previous leg, so they can’t be 100% certain when the next leg starts, and therefore whether or not it will immediately hit a bunch point.